


Oh, ho, the mistletoe!

by irrationalgame



Series: Thommy Xmas Prompts [4]
Category: Downton Abbey
Genre: Crack, Established Relationship, Fluff, Jimmy is an idiot, M/M, Nonsense, Stupidity, xmas fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-05
Updated: 2020-12-05
Packaged: 2021-03-09 20:28:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,319
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27892306
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/irrationalgame/pseuds/irrationalgame
Summary: When someone covers the servant’s hall with mistletoe Jimmy goes on a vendetta to find out who would do something so stupid.
Relationships: Thomas Barrow/Jimmy Kent
Series: Thommy Xmas Prompts [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2031865
Comments: 8
Kudos: 37
Collections: A Very Thomas Barrow Christmas 2020





	Oh, ho, the mistletoe!

**Author's Note:**

> For prompt 4: Mistletoe - “Who the hell hung all this mistletoe everywhere?”
> 
> Title from the song ‘A Holly Jolly Christmas.’
> 
> This version is Jimmy is very much inspired by my obsession with ‘The Diary of Jimmy Kent’

When Jimmy rushed into the servant’s hall, late as usual, to find the whole place covered in a layer of the familiar green stalks and white berries of mistletoe, he assumed one of the silly, empty-headed maids was responsible. As if the stupid, annoyingly merry season wasn’t bad enough already, without having to constantly dodge the lecherous lips of every bleedin’ woman in the house. There was only one person Jimmy would be kissing this Christmas and he wasn’t silly enough to plaster the whole place in blasted snogging berries.

“Who the hell hung all this mistletoe everywhere?” Jimmy sniped, “Was it you, Ivy?” It wouldn’t be out of character for the kitchen maid to do something so irritatingly desperate to try and wheedle a kiss out of him.

“It weren’t me!” Ivy said, “It was already here when I came down this mornin’.”

Jimmy flopped down in his chair and thew Daisy an accusatory look. “You then?” She was, for some unknown reason, pining away for love of Alfred, of all people. Perhaps it was a scheme to get the lanky oaf to finally kiss her.

Daisy glowered and said; “No it weren’t!” She dumped a plate of toast on the table and retreated to the kitchen with Ivy in tow.

The ginger lummox himself was sitting across the table reading a newspaper and sipping tea. Of course, he was the most obvious suspect. Jimmy wouldn’t put it past him to go to such an effort to steal a kiss - no one in their right mind would kiss him voluntarily.

“It were you, weren’t it?” Jimmy hissed.

“Nah,” Alfred said and shook his head, “it were a good idea though, whoever did it.”

Obviously Alfred was too stupid to think up such a scheme himself.

Anna and Bates were sitting a few chairs down, wrapped up in some disgustingly saccharine conversation and gazing at each other like they’d each hung the moon or something. It would be just like either one of them to do such a bleedin’ soppy thing. And Bates was clever enough, in that nasty conniving sort of way of his.

“Did you do it then?” Jimmy sneered.

“Do what?” Bates frowned.

“The mistletoe?”

“We don’t need an excuse to kiss, do we Mr Bates?” Anna smiled.

“No my darling, we don’t.” Bates simpered.

And they leant in and shared a chaste kiss on the lips. Right there in the servant’s hall, in front of Jimmy’s breakfast.

“Jesus Christ,” Jimmy exclaimed and pulled a face. This was exactly why mistletoe should be banned. And burned. And...made illegal. Or something.

“Why do you have to be so childish about everything?” Bates snapped, “I never thought I’d say this, but even Mr Barrow has more manners than _you_.”

Jimmy pushed his chair out and leapt to his feet. “What did you say about Mr Barrow?”

Bates was not impressed or intimidated in the slightest, which was odd because Jimmy knew he was indeed very manly _and_ intimidating. Perhaps Bates was under the incorrect assumption that Jimmy was too chivalrous to punch a cripple’s nose in.

“It was you I was insulting, actually,” Bates said with a sigh, “but you’re both unkind, selfish, sarcastic liars. It’s like working with a pair of particularly unpleasant wasps. You’re perfect for each other.”

Anna gave Bates a chastising look; “Mr Bates, nothing ungenerous!”

Jimmy was filled with an apoplectic rage - how _dare_ Bates say such things about Thomas - or himself! Of course. That was the important part. And he was insinuating something untoward was going on between them! Which, he supposed, there was. But it was still wrong of him to imply it. Jimmy was so angry he almost fell over his chair in a rush to physically attack Bates.

It was sort of funny that it ended up being Thomas who restrained him.

“Jimmy, Jimmy calm down!” Thomas said, holding him back. He’d happened to walk into the servant’s hall just as Jimmy was about to swing for a surprised Bates.

Bates jumped up with an agility Jimmy hadn’t expected from a cripple, his face thunderous.

Anna put a hand on his arm; “John, no, leave him!”

Jimmy squirmed in Thomas’s grip. “I’ll bloody lamp him one, I swear it Thomas!”

“No you won’t,” Thomas said, and bent Jimmy’s arm behind his back painfully, then frogmarched him outside into the yard.

“Get off,” Jimmy spat, “you’re hurting me!”

Thomas released his arm and practically threw him across the yard. “What has gotten into you?” he thundered.

Jimmy straightened out his livery angrily. “He bloody - he said - ugh, he insulted _you_.”

Thomas’s face softened instantly. “What?”

“He said you were unkind, selfish, sarcastic and a liar.” Jimmy huffed. “I couldn’t stand for it.”

Thomas smirked. “I’m sure I don’t need you to defend my honour Jimmy. Especially when what he said was true. But...thanks anyway, love.”

Jimmy nodded tightly.

“But how...why were you even discussing me with _Bates_?”

Jimmy explained about the sodding mistletoe and the Bates’s disgusting public display of affection.

Thomas pulled a face. “Revolting as that probably was for you to witness, it was only mistletoe. It’s not like they were making baby Bates’s on the table. I didn’t know you were such a prude.”

Jimmy snorted; “I am not a prude and you know it! Would a prude let you bugger him six ways to kingdom come every night?!

Thomas spluttered; “Jesus Jimmy, keep it down would you?”

“It’s just - it’s Christmas! It’s the bleedin’ mistletoe! I hate it!” Jimmy cried and threw his hands up in the air.

Thomas raised an eyebrow and pulled out his cigs - Jimmy took one gratefully with a shaking hand and let Thomas light it for him.

“So,” Thomas said, puffing on his cig, “why the vendetta against tacky Christmas traditions?”

Jimmy sat on the bench with a huff and felt himself deflate. “It’s stupid really. It’s just...when I worked at Anstruther’s she used to string the stuff up everywhere as soon as it hit December. Then she’d always want to be kissin’ me and touchin’ me and,” he shuddered with revulsion, “I felt...it made me feel dirty. I hated it.” He put his head in his hands, embarrassed.

Thomas settled next to him on the bench and put his arm around Jimmy’s shoulders, his proximity immediately comforting Jimmy’s frayed nerves. “I’m sorry. I am,” he said quietly.

“S’not your fault.”

“Well actually...”

Jimmy’s head snapped up. “You hung all that mistletoe everywhere? Why?”

Thomas blushed and took a long drag on his cig, then flicked the dog-end into the dirt. “You know why. But it’s stupid and I’m sorry and I’d never have done it if I’d known and...”

He was silenced by Jimmy pressing his lips against his mouth.

“You daft bugger,” Jimmy grinned, “all that for an excuse to kiss me? As if you need one.” He cringed internally at parroting the words of the Bates’s.

Thomas shrugged, “It’s our first Christmas together. I was just...I don’t know, trying to make it fun. You didn’t seem to be enjoying it much.”

Jimmy leant his head against Thomas’s shoulder. “Well. Maybe I could be made to enjoy mistletoe again. Do you have any on you?”

Thomas looked rightfully abashed as he pulled a sprig out of his livery pocket. “For emergencies,” he grinned and handed it to Jimmy.

Jimmy stood up and threaded the offending plant through his belt so it hung just above his crotch. “Oh Mr Barrow look?” he grinned, “Mistletoe!”

Thomas stared, incredulous, then fell about in fits of laughter.

“You - are - impossible!” he said between guffaws.

“Impossible to resist,” Jimmy sniggered, then leant down to kiss Thomas on the forehead.

Thomas wiped the tears of mirth from his eyes and said; “I’ll take it all down tonight, alright?”

“No,” Jimmy said, “leave it. Think I quite like mistletoe now.”


End file.
